Sunday, November 01, 2009

TWO WAYS

TWO WAYS

VIOLA GROENHART

TwoWays portrays two men as they climb a rocky, lifeless looking mountain. The men’s efforts are strenuous and the mood is tense. As we follow the youngest man on foot, we can feel his increasing anxiousness of keeping up. When his tension grows to a peak, something breaks. While losing foothold, almost falling, we stumble upon a different path.

The work of Viola Groenhart consists primarily of short films and videos that balance between classical cinema and fine arts. In her work she investigates how the moving image can be used to create a counterbalance to contemporary image-culture and the predominantly rational and consumptive state of mind it produces. The detailed and silent world Viola Groenhart creates with her films, offers an opportunity for broadening the way of looking, thinking and understanding to which we have become so habituated in daily life.

Viola Groenhart studied Fine Arts at the Gerrit Rietveld Academy in Amsterdam and Integrated Media at the Emily Carr Institute in Vancouver, Canada. She currently attends the post-graduate and audiovisual research centre Le Fresnoy, Studio National des Arts Contemporains, in Tourcoing, France.TwoWays was produced by Le Fresnoy Studio National des Arts Contemporains and was shot on location at Wasdale Head, Cumbria, United Kingdom, early 2009. The film could not have been realized without the very generous support of the Fonds voor Beeldende Kunst en Vormgeving and BE-PART Platform for Contemporary Art.